Wednesday, March 26, 2014

B-1 Bomber and F-16 Jet parts being illegally made in China

B-1 Bomber and F-16 Jet parts being illegally made in China

Talk about a national security concern. The Washington Timesreported today that Boeing and Lockheed Martin are using banned, Chinese-made parts for military aircraft and missiles (the latter produced jointly by Raytheon and Japan).

While American defense corporations are in the clear to use rare earth minerals from China having received a waiver to do so, using Chinese-made components without a similar clearance is against federal law due to “espionage fears and the concerns of becoming reliant on potential military adversaries for national security needs.”

“It’s really just sloppiness, frankly, when this happens,” said a defense official quote by the Times. “It’s not enough to say, ‘I’m pretty sure it didn’t come from China.’ That doesn’t work for us. We’re looking for documents.”

Investigators have contacted Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Boeing, and Raytheon, only to be referred back to the U.S. government.

The defense corporations, despite their violations of the law at the expense of national security, were freed of any penalties which they would have normally incurred by agreeing to “tighten up their buying procedures” in accordance with law.

While it appears that the defense companies were given a “get out of jail free” card, the defense official has claimed the opposite according to article at the Times.